Chap Goh Mei Celebration At City Park

             去年元夜时      花市灯如昼

             月上柳梢头       人约黄昏后

         During the night of Chap Goh Mei last year

         The flower market was brightly lit, as if in daylight

         As the moon was rising over the willows

         The youngsters met their dates after dusk

 A Chinese poem written a thousand years ago describes vividly what one will see at a park which is geared up and decorated for Chap Goh Mei celebration.

Chap Goh Mei, the 15^th night of the first lunar moon, is the Valentine for the Chinese. Thus you will see Lovers’ Bridge, platform for throwing mandarin oranges, the Match-making Deity, and other romance oriented decorations.

At the City Park of S2, there were fascinating lights, beautified Lovers’ Bridge, joyous crowd, and the majestic white mosque at the background. Together with the dreamy reflections in the water, they contributed to compose a spectacular frame of picture.

The whole premises was so brightened up and so colourful that one would be overwhelmed by the festive ambience.

The climax of the evening was the firework display. When the first bloom exploded in the air everyone was wowing in excitement. It’s simply awesome! It’s like seeing many ‘fire-flowers’ in all kinds of colour and shapes opening instantaneously in midair. Nothing is more spectacular than the sight of fire work display over a scenic place like City Park.

The Night Sky Over Seremban

I was told that if you want to do star-gazing, you must look for a place that is free from or having very little light pollution.

We are familiar with air pollution and water pollution, but what the hell is this light pollution?

Well, this is actually a photography jargon, meaning that the light from the ground is beaming up to the sky, making the sky less dark and the stars less bright. The light from the ground can be street lights, city lights, and residential lights.

Thus for the purpose of star-gazing, one must go to a pitch dark place which is far from city or housing areas, so that the darkness of the sky and therefore the brightness of the stars are not affected by the man-made lights from earth. In other words, to avoid light pollution.

In order to shoot beautiful pictures of the night sky, some photo bugs will travel to faraway and remote places, like Tioman Island, Fraser Hill, or even Bali in order to see an unpolluted night sky.

How about the night sky over Seremban which is a city?

Many people told me that it is impossible to do star-gazing in Seremaban due to heavy light-pollution. They said it is impossible to see the Milky Way here.

On the other hand I find it quite tough to follow others to trek in the wee hours in mosquito-infested places for the sake of photographing the night sky. So I wanted to take the challenge of shooting the stars in Seremban although my friends were quite scornful about the idea.

 Near my former house at Taman Bukit Kepayang there is a little limestone hill. It takes 15 minutes to climb to the top. I planned to carry out my mission up there.

One early morning, at around 5:30 am, I went up with my gear.

It was a bit chilly and windy, but the air was fresh. I could see the stars very clearly. I could even see a faint Milky Way.

The Milky Way was of course not as clear and impressive like what you see in the pictures taken at dark places. But it was still an image of a Milky Way captured in metropolitan Seremban. 

 If you are not familiar with the Milky Way it is call ‘Star River’星河 or ‘Silver River’银河 in Chinese. It is a long silvery stretch of stars that appear like a long shinny ribbon in the sky. According to Chinese folklore, the Cowherd牛郎 and Weaving-mate织女 who are separated by the ‘Silver River’ will meet once a year, that is on the 7^th day of the 7^th lunar month, on a bridge formed by the Robin Magpies across the River.

I managed to capture quite a number of pictures of the starry night sky over Seremban.

The night sky over Seremban is so beautiful, in spite of light pollution. Don’t you agree? 

The Hainanese Coffee

When we talk about a traditional Hainanese coffee shop, what’s the picture that comes to our mind? It will be an ordinary shop with lots of ceiling fans, marble-topped tables and wooden chairs. There will be a counter right at the front of the shop, which is the payment counter cum vending counter for cigarettes and candies.

Many years ago there would be a spittoon underneath every table and an essence-of-chicken bottle containing salt on each table. The cash counter would be manned by an old man or old lady who was the first generation who hailed from China. The cigarettes being sold were in packages of three sizes-6 sticks, 12 sticks, and 20 sticks. They were also in loose forms kept in different tins. There was a little oil lamp and strips of paper cut from empty ciggy boxes for smokers to light their ciggy.

 Today the traditional Hainanese coffee shops have not changed much. The spittoons and salt bottles have long been phased out. The marble-topped tables are being gradually replaced with Formica tables. Cigarettes are being sold at only one size-20 sticks. The oil lamp for lighting is no more around.

One also does not see crates of both empty and unopened bottles lying around because drinks are all in cans.

The hot drinks remained unchanged. They still serve Milo, Horlicks, Coco, tea, coffee, and ‘cham’.

What’s ‘cham’? One might ask.

Cham is the Chinese word for ‘blend’. It is actually a blend of tea and coffee. Cham is popular only in peninsular Malaysia, but not so in East Malaysia and Singapore. In Hong Kong, a blend of coffee and tea is called ‘Ying Yong’.

 Regular customers of a particular coffee shop, especially the ‘cham’ drinkers, will pick the person who brew his cham. Different customers may prefer different brewers. Why? This is because different brewer has different ratio of blending tea to coffee. The customer will like ‘cham’ from a brewer whose blending formula suits his taste. Some customers prefer a cham that is strong in coffee weak in tea, some the other way round, and some 50-50.There are coffee shop attendants who could remember the tastes of various customers and adjust the blending ratio to suit each and every one.

 So now we know why our parents and grandparents always went to the same coffee shop and insisted on being served by a certain attendant.

A hot beverage without milk is - -o, eg kopi-o; without milk and sugar is--kosong, eg teh kosong; with evaporated milk is --c, eg cham-c. If you want it thick it’s--kau, eg kopi-kau kau. If you want it thin it’s ---bok, eg teh-bok. If you want it with ice, then it’s ---bing, eg Cham-bing.

All those mentioned are common practices, but there are exceptional cases where people do not follow the norms. I have seen people drinking Milo with raw egg added and coffee with margarine added.

 Besides the Hailam coffee they also serve roti and half-boiled eggs. Roti can be either steamed or bakar, spread with kaya, and/or margarine, and/or butter. The kaya is normally made by the shop and is therefore fresh and without preservative.

One can see that the traditional coffee shops are dwindling in numbers. Younger generations prefer to hangout at Starbuck, Coffee Beans, Mc D and KFC. The art of making Hailam coffee will soon become lost. Soon nobody will know what’s ‘cham’, let alone appreciating it. So before it becomes extinct, just visit your nearest Hainanese coffee shop, eg King Lam Fung of the Mantin town, to have a taste of ‘cham’掺. I suggest you order ‘cham-c kurang manis’.

Mantin La Zha Noodles

If any foodie friend of mine from other places comes to Mantin to pay me a visit, and asks me to take him to try something that is peculiar to Mantin, I will certainly feed him with La Zha noodles.

La Zha is the nick name given by the people. It means ‘dirty’. Why? Because the outlet does not look clean at all, and the location, being very close to the wet market and garbage bins, seems highly unhygienic.

       

But the business is so good that during the weekends there is always a long queue, both for taking-away and waiting for empty tables. It is not uncommon to wait for 45 minutes before one can be served.

Of course the original name is not La Zha. We used to call it Zha Yan Foon. But it has become infamous with this nickname and few people know the name of the stall-Hee Kee.

What so great about this noodle? The noodles are just ordinary noodles from the factory. The toppings are pieces of the fried meat-ball, and a thick starchy gravy containing pork skin, pork blood cubes, and thin slices of fried pork, which has been stewed for hours. There is zero vegetables. In fact, some people, especially those having it for the first time, discard the blood cubes and pork skins. 

But for the many people who have grown up in Mantin, this is their comfort food. They feel nostalgic about this noodle. By having this noodle their mind wander back to the past, and to their childhood days, be it sweet or bitter. Hence during the weekends, many outstation folks who come back to visit their parents also visit this stall to relive the memories.

The noodles can be kon-lau (dry), zhu-sui (soup), or laksa.But many people complain that the laksa one is not like before, lacking a certain ingredient or effort.

How to describe the taste of this food? Well, it’s tasty and unique. There is no similar food elsewhere, not even close to it.

This is a Hakka food and a Mantin food which represents the ethnicity and history of this little township. The people manning the stall are the third generation. The price has gone up from 30 cents to RM 3.50 over the years. But we pray that it will not be like some other Mantin food, have become lost in history.

A Place Called Chennai Station

     
  We were invited by the boss of The Chennai Station of Uptown, S2 to taste their food on the opening day. There are two large pictures which looked so real and impressive.

 
    While waiting for the food to be ready, we warmed up our gear.

     My wife Helen has been avoiding spicy food for the past 4 years. This is the first time she is on Indian food again.

     I like this stand for pepper and salt.

     I believe the boss himself is cutting the ribbon.

     
    My photokaki CS is in full concentration

        I am a photographer rather than a foodie, and so I am like a Japanese, when come to good food, or I could think of is ' Oishi '. I just can't think of other words to describe nice food. Thanks to the ladies to have arranged the dishes in this order for photography. Chennai Station specialises in Southern Indian food. As I said, all I could tell is delicious.

  I was served a lassi drink with curry leaves added. This is a very good drink to accompany the spicy food.

    This is an appetiser made from onion and yogurt.

 
        Another appetiser called Curd Rice

                   Pickles

                Papadam

 
        Roti canai that is without oil

                                                                 Dhal

 
                                                                      Mutton Curry

                   Vege Dum Briyani. For the vegetarians

                         Gobi 65. Why 65? I do not know

               Chicken Dum Briyani.

         Chicken 65

                                        Crab Soup

     We have had a wonderful lunch, and have tasted the delicious Southern Indian cuisines made possible by  The  Chennai Station.